In John 3:3, Jesus says, “Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.” In verse 6, He says “That which is born of the flesh is flesh and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.”
When we were born as human babies, we were born into the flesh that Jesus talks about in verse 6. Human flesh is sinful flesh. When we ask for God’s forgiveness, we are “born again” and God’s Spirit comes to live in us. This is a Spiritual birth that takes place in our heart.
II Corinthians 5:17 says “Therefore if any man is in Christ, he is a new creature; old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.”
Being born again gives us the right to go to the Lord and lean on Him in times of trial and tribulation, to draw on His strength and peace when things seem beyond us. We that are followers of Jesus have the assurance that if we draw nearer to God, He will draw nearer to us (James 4:8).
This is one of the reasons why we need to not only accept Jesus and trust Him as a child would trust a parent (Matthew 18:3), but we need to grow in our faith through daily Bible study and prayer. If we have given our lives to Him to use for His will, then we need to learn, and grow, and live that life for the One that died for us.
When we accept that Christ was crucified to pay the penalty for our sins, when we ask Him to live in our heart as our Lord and Savior, we, in effect, crucify our old selves. Our physical bodies are still alive, but our spiritual being is reborn with Christ and takes on His nature, with new principles and outlooks.
The power of the Holy Spirit changes us in a way that we are incapable of doing ourselves. We are not strong enough to accomplish this change on our own. We need the saving grace of God and the strength of the Holy Spirit in us to bring this change into being. And we need this change in order to see the kingdom of God.
Jesus came to save us, to be the Light shining in the darkness of our sin. He took the punishment for our sin on Himself so that we might have forgiveness and eternal life (John 3:16-21).
In John 8:12 Jesus said, “I am the light of the world: he that followeth me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life.”
The sinful person lives in the darkness that comes from a sinful world. They will hide from the light of Jesus for fear that their sins will be discovered. But once they accept Christ’s light into their lives, that light overpowers the darkness of sin and shines forth for all the world to see.
© Drusilla Mott and https://drusillamott.wordpress.com, 2011
